THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE
Photograph by Melville Chater
DIM RELICS OF A GLORY LONG DEPARTED (SEE, ALSO, PAGE 685)
Sidon's harbor, where once proud fleets of Phoenician galleys rode at anchor, now shelters
only humble fishing craft. The ruined fortifications on the islet in the background date from
the Middle Ages, when Saracen and Crusader were matching strength along the Syrian shore.
-w omen were the redoubtable Amazons of
Greek legend. Other carvings reveal their
worship of a Zeuslike lightning god who
was symbolized by the bull, and of the
nature mother, Ma, to whom was dedi
cated the lioness or panther. Attempts
have been made to relate the Hittites ra
cially to the Turkomans, but their origin
must remain a riddle until their inscrip
tions at Carchemish, Boghaz Keui, and
elsewhere are deciphered.
That one has merely crossed the thresh
Sold of a once-mighty race now all but ob
Sliterated in mystery is the lasting impres
sion which one carries from those grimly
sculptured processional figures at Jera
blus.
'
VAST STRETCHES OF NOTHING IN
PARTICULAR
Such a mass of tradition has accumu
lated around Syria and Palestine that one
is apt to expect his trip through those
countries to be one of continuous interest.
To say that they contain great barren
stretches of nothing in particular, inter-
spersed with oases of absorbing charm,
would be much nearer to fact.
Thus, in an entire day of 223 miles of
railway travel from Aleppo southward,
we saw little except treeless, sun-scorched
plains containing but two considerable
towns, with here and there a Kurdish
"beehive" village whose unpartitioned
mud huts, set closely together, resembled
a cluster of large, brown bowling pins.
It was a relief to the eye, upon nearing
Hami,to find that flat-roofed, mud-walled
town lying in a stripe of dark-green ver
dure between the dust-brown slopes, the
Orontes River snaking past some great
water wheels, at their ceaseless work of
irrigation. Such a friend is the water
bearer in Syria that, like desert springs,
each of these wheels is dignified by its
own name (see page 676).
Black minarets of basalt lifted into
view, marking Homs, at which station our
train halted, so that everyone could enjoy
a fifteen-minute smoke; or so we judged
by the presence of various small boys,
who ran along the platform, carrying
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